Asylum Eyes.

stroma

The asylum of Eddie’s eyes.

It’s not something Chris would ever mention to him (and he, too, tries to ignore the thought), but when he gets a look into those mudpit irises, swallowed down by the dark of his pupils, he is back there.

It’s dangerous. There is a vacuousness in those eyeballs that scares him. There’s a tunnel through them to a cell, a path to a mess hall. Except, no… that wasn’t the asylum.

Maybe it isn’t good for him to be around Eddie. It reminds him too much of all the positions he’s ever been bent into, whether inside of a white coiled jacket or around an American flag. Eddie’s wavering voice, like a ringing phone that plays back all the pleading he’s ever done.

Eddie reflects the loudest part of Chris’ brain, but he puts something in it, at least.

The bedlam of the quiet of his mind.

When he sees himself in others, it’s… too dangerous. To keep looking. But what will swallow him, if not Eddie? What demon to eat him, if not a dark mass that has already digested him once?